Scientific integrity in the digital age: Data fabrication

Abstract

Scientific society is unable to effectively define the boundaries between fraudulent acts and examples of poor science. This article examines the current level of fraud (especially data fabrication) and presents a proposal that involves conducting data audits of submitted manuscripts to prevent the publication of fraudulent work. Similar to the legal and medical professions, the relatively narrow-minded academic scientific community has always preferred to deal with instances of fraud and misconduct quietly, without external intervention. Recent highly publicized instances of scientific misconduct have stunned the electrochemical community, renewing calls for different approaches to address this growing threat to the position and trust of science within our society and, consequently, the generous public funding of academic research. © 2013 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht.